


Not Without You: A Stucky Collection

by AidaRonan



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Wedding Planner, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Bucky Barnes Remembers, College AU, Drabble Collection, Eavesdropping, Fluff, Kisses, M/M, Natasha Romanov Is a Good Bro, One Shot Collection, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Rating may change as I add additional stories, Tumblr Prompts, Wedding Fluff, World War II, alternate universe - someone's wedding, bucky is a menace, possibly some secondhand embarrassment issues for the first story, though most people said it's not that bad
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-11
Updated: 2018-11-04
Packaged: 2019-07-11 00:04:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,142
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15960425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AidaRonan/pseuds/AidaRonan
Summary: A place for me to throw stuff I write on Tumblr.1. Steve eavesdrops on Bucky and Nat's Russian conversations to improve his skills. Wait, though, are they talking abouthim? (College AU, no serum)2. How the Howling Commandos got their name. (WW2 Era)3. "It's six o'clock in the morning. You're not having vodka." (Post TWS)5. Kiss prompt: tiptoe kiss + distraction kiss (AU no superpowers - setting: Rebecca's wedding)





	1. синий

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> From a [Daily AU](http://dailyau.tumblr.com/post/177414061274/you-and-your-friend-always-sit-at-the-table-a) prompt:
> 
> _You and your friend always sit at the table a couple down from mine and gossip in [insert language here], which happens to be a language i’m currently learning. i’ve been eavesdropping to try and improve my listening comprehension and oh my god are you actually talking about how hot i am???_

They’re speaking Russian again, just like they did all last semester. Steve had been just a little worried that he might not be able to eavesdrop anymore after winter break. But it seems their schedules still line up, and he finds them at their usual table in the dining hall at lunch. Dropping his backpack in an empty seat, he sets his tray nearby and starts peeling an orange.   
  
Steve is in RUS 202 now, a whole semester of Petrov’s rapid speech and tough practical tests behind him. He also spent his break using everything from Duolingo to Pimsleur to stay on top of what he’d learned and advance further. Now, he can hold stilted conversations with Lyudmila at the market near his apartment. She smiles, pats his cheek, and cuts his slices of ptichye moloko extra large.   
  
He has these two strangers to thank for that as well. The redhead who seems to be afraid to wear anything that’s an actual color and her friend (boyfriend? brother?) who always dresses like he was personally styled by the Queer Eye team, including his perfect dark hair and varying levels of always-neat-at-the-edges scruff. He’s at a level three today, short dark hair coating a jawline that could cut steel. Steve thinks he looks particularly good in blue, which is the color he seems to be wearing, a fitted cobalt button-down stretching over the muscles of his back.   
  
Steve also thinks he looks good curling his gorgeous mouth around Russian words, but he’s not here to stare. Mostly. 

He concentrates on listening instead, on how they fit their sentences together and the ways the structure differs from English. It takes him a second to translate, but he’s faster than he was back at the beginning of the fall semester. When he only got one in twenty words and was maybe sure they were talking about a barbecue they went to. 

Then again, that first overheard conversation could’ve also been about a particularly spicy jar of salsa. Or a house fire.   
  
“ _It wouldn’t kill you to say hello,”_ Red says in Russian, stealing a fry from Blue’s plate. 

“ _You can’t know that,”_ Blue says, moving his plate away from her and curling an arm around it defensively. “Those  _[something] are murder.”  
_

Steve tries his best to jot down the word he didn’t understand, spelling it out phonetically so he can attempt to Google it later.   
  
_“He’s cute. You’re alone. Very alone,”_  Red says. 

Wait, no not “alone,” probably “single.” It sounds a little less cruel that way anyway.   
  
Wait, Blue’s single. And she said “he,” meaning…   
  
Steve flushes and shakes his head, tucking his pen behind his ear so he can tear off another slice of orange.   
  
“ _He’s too attractive for [something] like me,”_ Blue says _,_ and Steve chokes on his orange slice. He can fill in that blank just fine, and there’s no way in hell anyone is out of Blue’s league. Guys like Blue  _are_  the league.   
  
“ _He’s choking. Go help him. Give him mouth to mouth.”_

What?   
  
WHAT?

“ _You don’t use mouth to mouth for choking,”_ Blue says. “ _Besides, the second I touched those lips I’d probably [something] and then who’s gonna help him?”_

Steve manages to dislodge the orange, forcing it down with a couple drinks of water, but getting his breathing under control is another story entirely. Because there’s no way in hell that they aren’t talking about him. Steve’s not always the most confident guy, but even his brain can’t manage to explain that away as some strange coincidence.   
  
What does he do? It was one thing to eavesdrop for the purposes of education when they were talking about cats or Red’s martial arts or the next flyover of the ISS. It’s another thing when it’s a private conversation he’s definitely not meant to hear.   
  
How does one feel guilty and giddy all at the same time?   
  
(Holy shit, that means he’s the guy out of Blue’s league? How the hell? He has a fucking asthma inhaler in his shirt pocket and he’s seriously considering getting it out and Blue thinks he…) 

Maybe his hearing aide is broken. Steve taps it lightly, cringing a bit at the sound. Nope, still functional. And he always turns his good ear toward them anyway.   
  
He takes another drink, his hand shaking on the glass. He has to say something, right? That’s the right thing to do and Steve tries his hardest to always do the right thing.   
  
“ _I could invite him to my party,”_ Red says. “ _Then you can try to actually speak to him. Maybe kiss him under the stairs.”_  
  
“ _His hair looks really good today,”_ Blue says, running right over her suggestion like he didn’t hear her. “ _Does it look more gold than usual to you?”_  
  
“Hmm.” 

Steve tries in vain to fight the flush coloring his cheeks. If Blue’s looking at his hair, then he’ll notice if he turns fifteen shades of red, won’t he? And if he notices, won’t it be obvious that Steve can understand?   
  
His skin burns despite his will, warmth cascading down his cheeks and neck and into his shirt.   
  
He makes himself turn because he can’t take any more of this and if he doesn’t say something soon, he’ll die of guilt or embarrassment or both. He finds Blue’s eyes staring directly at him, the other man jolting and turning away too quickly for it not to be obvious that he was looking. Red actually laughs, winking at Steve when he looks over at her.   
  
Now or never. Steve fully turns in his seat, squaring his shoulders.   
  
“Я говорю по-русски _,”_ Steve says.  _I speak Russian._  “Not as fluently as you guys, but…”   
  
“Oh God,” Blue says, in English.   
  
Steve pushes himself up and walks over, setting the notebook down because it’s the only thing he can think to do. The word from earlier is all he’s managed to jot down in their conversation.   
  
“You said something like this earlier. What does it mean?” he asks.   
  
“Oh fuck,” Blue says, burying is face in his hands.   
  
“Cheekbones,” Red says, grinning.   
  
“Natasha,” Blue says.   
  
“James,” Natasha says.   
  
“Steve,” Steve says. 

“He’ll want you to call him Bucky.” Natasha leans back in her chair. “Because that’s a thing.”   
  
“I want to crawl in a hole and die right now, actually,” James/Bucky says. “But yeah, call me Bucky even if some people’s best friends refuse to.”   
  
“Steve,” Steve repeats, flushing again because yeah, he already said that.   
  
“I’m so sorry,” Bucky says.   
  
“I’m not.” Steve grabs the nearest chair and pulls it close   
  
“Ooh, see I told you to say hello.” Natasha takes the opportunity to steal another fry.   
  
Bucky sighs and looks up, running his right hand back through his hair. Steve actually watches him shove his nerves back, forcing a charming smile into the space they leave behind. It’s crooked and adorable (and still nervous even with a lot of effort to make it otherwise) and Steve wants to kiss each corner.   
  
“Hello, Steve,” Bucky says. “Natasha is having a party tonight. You should come.”   
  
“ _I’d love to_ ,” Steve answers, fumbling his way through the words in Russian. “ _I heard something about the stairs that sounded fun._ ”   
  
Natasha laughs again before asking for Steve’s Facebook so she can add him and send him an invitation. She has him add Bucky too.   
  
Several hours later, she finds him and Bucky, not under the stairs but on the back porch, Steve’s hand twined with a prosthetic he didn’t know Bucky even had. They’ve spent half the party just talking about school and their plans and the upcoming lunar eclipse. They kiss during the lulls in the conversation and then talk more. Bucky wants to be an engineer for NASA. Steve wants to teach ethics and draw comics on the side.   
  
Bucky’s lips are even softer than they look.   
  
“What have we learned?” Nat asks, handing them a cup of something that smells like orange juice and ethanol. Steve only takes small sips.   
  
“Cute boys that always sit near you at lunch probably speak Russian also?” Bucky grins at her, and she shakes her head.   
  
“Always listen to your best friend,” Steve says, nudging Bucky with his elbow. “Especially when she’s trying to get you to ask me out, because that’s a great idea.”   
  
That earns Steve a smile that only makes Natasha look a little like an apex predator instead of a lot.   
  
“James, if you break his heart, I’ve already planned your murder at least seven ways.”   
  
“Shouldn’t you be giving him that speech as my best friend?” Bucky asks.   
  
But she leaves them alone after that, off to tend to the rest of her party guests and some guy named Clint, who is drunk and keeps trying to climb on top of the bookshelf to declare his undying love for her.   
  
Steve and Bucky keep kissing. 


	2. Wolf Pack

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The people responsible for this drabble know who they are.

The now-defunct Hydra base casts a red glow on the surrounding forest, the shadows of bare trees dancing in the flickering light. The smell of smoke tells Steve the mission is done. He pats the hard lump of maps and photos tucked into his jacket. Still safe and ready to be handed over to SSR when they make it back to base.   
  
His men flank him, Bucky on his left, Dugan on his right. SSR Unit 3239. Howard keeps joking that they need a better name or else history will give them one they might not like. He keeps throwing them out when they meet, wedging suggestions between ideas for Bucky’s rifle, Gabe’s radio, Dernier’s explosives.   
  
“Captain America and the Rogue Forces.” Howard splays his hands out dramatically.   
  
“Hell no,” Bucky says, looking through the enhanced scope Stark made up. His approval comes in the form of him tucking it into his pocket.   
  
Their unit nickname doesn’t cement right away, but Bucky’s the one who’s ultimately responsible. That night there in the forest. There’s a full moon overhead when he slips out of a tree, glances at the burning Hydra base, and unceremoniously drops his pants. A single shake of his bare ass at the crumbling compound and then he throws his head back and howls straight up, his voice echoing eerily through the woods.

“Quite right, sergeant,” Falsworth says, clapping Bucky on the shoulder when he puts himself right.   
  
The next time Bucky does it, it’s snowing and broad daylight. So cold that they almost don’t want to leave the warmth of the burning base behind. Dugan laughs and joins in. Then Dernier.   
  
“Fuck it,” Morita says, undoing his belt buckle. Four bare-assed, shivering men howl up at a gray-white sky.   
  
Falsworth and Jones don’t even take time to think it over the next time it happens. Steve finds himself somewhere in a damp forest in France, staring at every single one of his men, full moons pointed back at their latest successful mission.   
  
“C’mon Steve,” Bucky says. The glint in his eye manages to be playful, dangerous, and angry-at-the-world all at once.   
  
“Bucky, I can’t.”   
  
“The Steve Rogers I knew back in Brooklyn would’ve mooned some goddamn Nazis,” Bucky says.   
  
“The Steve Rogers you knew wasn’t goddamn  _Captain America_ , Buck.”  
  
He expects Bucky to continue trying to talk him into it. Or to call him a spoilsport and howl with the others sans Steve.   
  
“Bok. Bok, bok, bok, bok, bok,” is what comes out of Bucky’s mouth instead. He flaps his arms half heartedly. And Steve is genuinely mad that he’s blushing at being called a chicken by a man with his pants around his ankles.   
  
Then the rest of the men join in taunting him and flapping, and Steve can feel his flush down to his waist. He steps up defiantly and drops his pants, sliding in between Bucky and Falsworth.   
  
Every single one of them howl, pull up their pants, and trudge back toward base like it never happened.   
  
But it happened, and Dugan can’t help but tell the story to a bunch of greenies in a mess hall in London when they’re so kind as to share a bottle of pilfered whiskey. He also decides it’s wholly necessary to include the fact that the sarge doesn’t wear his army issued underwear under his uniform.   
  
“They chafe,” Bucky says casually, throwing a wink at Steve, and the men dissolve into laughter again.   
  
“Here’s to the Howling Commandos!” someone calls, raising a tin cup in the air. Whiskey sloshes over the side.   
  
Bucky’s face splits wide, and it’s one of those rare moments in the war that he looks like he might be genuinely happy.   
  
“To the Howling Commandos!” he echoes. And then he starts a round of howls with the boys (and Steve) that has someone in the brass poking their head in a few minutes later to tell them to all quiet the hell down ‘ _before all of Germany knows the exact position of HQ’_  (until they see Steve and go sheet white anyway).   
  
Seventy some odd years later, Steve meets Howard Stark’s son for the first time.   
  
“Is it true they called you the Howling Commandos because-”   
  
“Tony. Don’t.”   
  
They sure as hell don’t include it in the Smithsonian exhibit. 


	3. Back to Bucky

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: “It’s six o’clock in the morning, you’re not having vodka.”

After DC, Bucky comes and goes like a shitty bus line. Steve know he’ll show up again eventually, but the schedule is so erratic and unpredictable that there’s no point in even trying to keep up with it.   
  
Steve doesn’t care, of course. He’ll take it over the alternatives. And every time Bucky comes, it’s with a few recovered memories and a couple dozen questions Steve is more than happy to answer.   
  
On a random Wednesday morning in September, Steve finds Bucky rooting around in his kitchen and immediately texts Sam to let him know he won’t make their daily jog.   
  
“Hey, Buck.”   
  
There’s no visible reaction other than a small jerk of Bucky’s head. When he finally emerges from the cabinets, it’s with a box of cherry Pop Tarts and a bottle of Moskovskaya. Steve, a person who neither drinks nor eats Pop Tarts, has a couple of questions. But he can worry about those later.

“That’s quite the breakfast,” he says instead, watching Bucky hop up onto the countertop.   
  
Bucky shrugs and rips open a silver package, shoving half a Pop Tart in his mouth. Bottle held tight between his thighs, he undoes the lid with metal fingers and moves to take a drink.   
  
“Buck, it’s six o’clock in the morning. You’re not having vodka.”   
  
“Kinda seems like I am,” he says, taking a big swig. “I remembered something. Well, lots of somethings.”   
  
“Oh.” Steve doesn’t know what else to say. Bucky’s memories can be everything from a baseball game they listened to as kids to a gruesome triple murder in Guam.   
  
“I can’t believe…” He shakes his head and shoves the rest of the Pop Tart into his mouth, washing it down with more vodka. “Steve, you huge asshole.”   
  
“Which thing am I a huge asshole for?” Steve asks. Because his memory is as sharp as Bucky’s knives and he knows “asshole” is a term of endearment Bucky used on him quite a lot.  
  
“Honestly, where do I fucking start?” He takes a bite out of the other Pop Tart, swigging vodka like water. Steve tries not to grimace at what he imagines that all tastes like together. “God, Stevie, you absolute goddamned punk.”   
  
Steve’s knees almost buckle at that. Would probably crumple like aluminum foil if he wasn’t what he is. It’s such a simple thing, but Bucky calling him “Stevie” means that another piece of the old Bucky has put itself right in his torn up brain.   
  
Every time Bucky pops into his life, he’s reminded just a little bit of how lucky he is to have him back. Even if he hates how it happened so much that the fury burns white hot. Even if Bucky is transient and fleeting.   
  
“I went to the Smithsonian when you were in the hospital,” Bucky says. “After…” He waves his hand in the air before pulling out another package of so-called pastries.  
  
“Yeah, I know.” SHIELD had been in shambles, but that didn’t mean Nat didn’t have her eyes open. She’d handed Steve a flash drive full of security footage a few days later with no explanation as to how she got it, and he’d spent weeks stalking his own exhibit until Bucky blew in through the apartment window one night and sat himself on Steve’s couch like it was no big deal.   
  
“Lot of things history doesn’t know about us, huh?” Bucky asks.    
  
“You could say that.”   
  
“You could’ve corrected them,” Bucky says. “And you could’ve told me.  _Best friends._ ”   
  
“We  _were_  best friends. Too, also. But I thought about it a few times, especially when people came sniffing around trying to get Captain America to voice his support for  _traditional family values_  and all that.” Steve finally pulls up a stool and sits down at the counter. “But then it didn’t feel fair to your memory to take that choice away from you.”   
  
“Unbelievable.” Bucky offers him half a Pop Tart and Steve decides to give them another try.   
  
He takes one bite and registers the sickly sweet taste before handing it back. Bucky pushes it between his lips and licks crumbs off his fingers.   
  
“What did you remember?” Steve asks.   
  
“We were, what? Seventeen. Or I was. You…”   
  
“Sixteen.” Steve nods. “Our first kiss, right?”   
  
“Yeah. You had on one of my old shirts Ma gave you when it didn’t fit me anymore, and I couldn’t get over it. I ever tell you that?” Bucky asks, and Steve shakes his head. “Wanted you longer. Off and on for years. I tried so hard not to, Stevie. God, I did.”   
  
“I know Buck. We both tried.” Steve had prayed until his knees were bruised, had felt the guilt settle in his stomach heavy and thick. But no deity or force in the universe had ever taken his love for Bucky from him, and he’d eventually decided that if it was wrong, really and truly perverse like everyone said, that his prayers would’ve been answered. Either that or no one was listening, and if no one was listening, then it didn’t really matter at all who his fucked up little heart beat for. 

“Almost went crazy trying,” Steve adds. 

“Me too, Stevie. But then you walked into my Ma’s house in  _my shirt_ and I couldn’t take it anymore. I knew I was gonna finally do it, second I saw you that day. I was determined that somehow-”   
  
Bucky shakes his head and pulls on the vodka again. And if he could get drunk any more than Steve could, Steve might be more concerned. Bucky’s still stone cold sober after half a bottle though. Steve would know. He knows good and well what a drunk Bucky Barnes looks like.   
  
“Then I ruined it,” Steve says, smiling.   
  
“You kissed  _me_ ,” Bucky says. “Spent all afternoon formulating my genius plan to have you dart up quick as a shooting star, plant one on me, and go back to doodling. Punk.” 

Steve smiles softly. He’d been so scared, so scared Bucky would never speak to him again. That drawing had turned out like shit, the always-sharp line of Bucky’s jaw uneven and ragged under his trembling hand.   
  
“You wouldn’t sit still. You never did even though you asked me to draw you all the time,” Steve says. “I had to stun you so i could finish. Desperate times.”   
  
“I remember France too,” Bucky says. “In the woods. When we were ‘scouting ahead.’”   
  
Steve flushes.  
  
“Oh.”   
  
“Yeah, oh.”   
  
“Do you remember…” Steve scrubs a hand over his face. He doesn’t want to push. That’s the thing Sam always tells him, that Steve is like a hurricane when he sets his mind to something, and Bucky doesn’t need a storm right now.  
  
“My birthday. 1937. Yeah, Stevie, I remember,” Bucky says, looking down at the tile. “I remember how you smelled. How you tasted. How you sounded when you said my name, so quiet because the walls were like goddamn newspaper. I remember all of it.”   
  
“Does it feel like a long time ago for you?” Steve asks. “Because for me, it’s…”   
  
“It’s hard to explain how it feels,” Bucky says. “It’s like I went to sleep next to you and the boys and had a really long nightmare, but then I woke up and-”   
  
“Everything was different.” Steve sighs. “Yeah, I know. That part of it anyway, I know.”   
  
“They don’t arrest people like us anymore.”   
  
“They don’t, not here anyway.”   
  
“You told me months ago that if I ever wanted to, I could stay.”   
  
Steve perks up, tries not to let himself hope too hard even though his heart is straining with the effort.   
  
“You still can,” Steve says.   
  
“I wondered at first, why you? I couldn’t understand why you were the one who pulled me back, out of everyone. I thought it was just because I knew you, because we were friends, but then I remembered Howard.”   
  
Steve doesn’t frown, but he wants to.   
  
“I went to the exhibit trying to make sense of it, accepted that you were my best friend, that maybe there were more memories and that’s why you could do it when he couldn’t. More years to draw on, you know, and maybe that really did help. But I loved you. I loved you so goddamn much that they had to torture me for decades to take you out of me, and even then they still couldn’t do it.”   
  
“You gotta know I loved you too,” Steve says.   
  
“Might’ve figured that one out after you told me for the 50th time,” Bucky says. “Or when you came after me in Azzano all by yourself. When you’d pat me down after every mission just to be sure nothing hurt.”   
  
“You’d pat me down too.”   
  
“You never watched your goddamn left side. And your shield is the size of one of Ma’s nice china plates. I shot you. I shot you on that helicarrier in DC because you keep trying to hide behind a fucking thimble.”   
  
Bucky sets the empty Pop Tarts box down next to him and takes another drink.   
  
“I still love you,” Steve says. “You gotta know that too.”   
  
“I’m not the same guy,” Bucky says. “Your Bucky, he’s up here, but there’s a lot of other shit too.”   
  
“I know,” Steve says. “But we’ve done this before.”   
  
Another sip. The sound of vodka sloshing within the confines of the glass bottle. Bucky glances at him, questioning.   
  
“You were different in the war too. After the rescue.” Steve shrugs.   
  
Bucky laughs in a way that looks more like a grimace. “Yeah, so were you pal.”   
  
Steve can’t argue with that. He cracks a smile.  
  
“Really though, Buck, I’ve loved every version of you I’ve ever met. I’m not gonna stop now.” Steve looks down, threading his fingers together on the stool between his thighs. “If you don’t want me like that anymore, I won’t push you. You have a home here whether we share a bed or not. You’re still my best friend; they got that right. But if you do want me, don’t think I won’t take you. You’re not the only one who’s not the same.”   
  
The vodka bottle finds its way to the countertop with a dull clink. Bucky’s fingers linger, drumming on the neck again. Tink-tink-tink.   
  
“I wasn’t lying,” Bucky says. “It really did take them decades to wipe you out of my head. They’d pack me out on a mission, and I’d see something that reminded me of you and snap back.”   
  
Tink-tink-tink.   
  
“It’s something I’ve tried to tell myself over and over, that I killed a lot of folks for Hydra, but I killed a lot more of those bastards in the years they had me. Sum total, you know.”   
  
“It’s a good way to look at it,” Steve says. “It’s proof of who you always were underneath what they made you be.”   
  
Tink-tink-tink. Silence. Bucky shifts on the granite and looks at him.   
  
“I still love you too,” he says. “Everything’s a mess up there, but even so. Feels like I always have.”   
  
Steve breathes in, deep and even, and nods.   
  
“What do you wanna do about it?”   
  
He’s surprised when Bucky reaches out his right hand, offering it to him. They’re not at the best angle for it, but Steve takes it anyway, cupping it between both of his palms. He softly presses his lips to the veins and tendons along the back.   
  
“It’s gonna be glacial,” Bucky says. “Like asshole-crashes-his-plane-into-the-arctic-because-he-can’t-live-without-me glacial. It’s not that I don’t want you, because I do. I’ve already had a million thoughts about you and me and all the furniture in this room. Hell, I woke up this morning wanting you which is why I even came here. Wanna kiss you too. Wanna wake up with your hair tickling my nose like we used to. It’s just that I don’t trust me yet.”   
  
Steve ignores the small jolt of heat that runs through his body, pushes back all the selfish questions he’d like to ask.   
  
“I’ve got time,” he says instead. “Besides, I’m used to that too. Before the war, before-” Steve gestures at his body.   
  
They’d made love, the first time on Bucky’s birthday, but more after. It was always once in a blue moon though. Sometimes the blood flow in Steve’s body just outright refused to cooperate. Sometimes Bucky would take a kiss from sweet to hot and Steve’s lungs would seize up, and he’d end up on the floor pressed against Bucky while he reminded him how to breathe. Shit, sometimes they were just too scared someone would hear them. And on top of that, Steve was sick all the time, too sick to do anything but shiver in Bucky’s arms.   
  
Bucky turns his hand over, shifting on the countertop so he can wind his fingers around Steve’s properly. They sit like that for what could be minutes or hours or lifetimes, and it’s okay. If it’s all he can ever give Steve again, it’ll be okay.   
  
“I’ll go get my stuff,” Bucky finally says, letting go and screwing the cap back on the vodka. He puts it away in the freezer instead of the cabinet.   
  
“You need any help?”   
  
“I don’t got a lot. Won’t be long this time. An hour, maybe.”   
  
“Can I-” Steve holds his arms open, a quiet invitation that Bucky’s more than welcome to refuse. Bucky stares at him for a moment, metal fingers twitching by his side.   
  
“Okay, but you gotta- just be still.” Bucky steps forward slowly, pressing himself up against Steve bit by bit and wrapping his arms around him. From here, Steve can smell him, and God he still smells like Bucky. Even under the notes of modern soap and laundry detergent. Steve forces his muscles and bones to stay right where they are even though all he wants to do is pull Bucky closer and closer until they melt into one being. It’s a relief when Bucky finally says, “Okay Stevie, you can put your arms around me. I’m ready.”   
  
Steve does, gently settling his hands under Bucky’s shoulder blades. He feels Bucky stiffen a bit and then relax. Slowly, with no sudden movements, he presses his nose into Bucky’s neck and inhales. For the first time since he woke up in the SHIELD field office in New York, he feels like he’s actually home.   
  
Bucky comes back a half hour later as promised and throws his duffle into the closet in the former guest room. They spend the rest of the day reminiscing and eating take out. It’s easier than either of them thought it would be.   
  
“You really should tell them,” Bucky says days later. They’re on opposite ends of the couch, reading, legs tangled in between them. “About us, about you. Could mean a lot to a lot of people.”   
  
“Okay.” Steve doesn’t hesitate to pull his phone out of his pocket and send a text.   
  
A week later, he’s sitting in a coffee shop with Gabby Jones, the openly transgender editor-in-chief of the _New York Sentinel_. She also happens to be Gabe’s granddaughter, and they talk for an hour about the man she remembers before they even get into why they’re really there.   
  
“Pepper said you have a story to tell.” She takes a sip from a fresh latte. “Where would you like to start, Steve?”   
  
The answer is as easy as it ever was.   
  
“With Bucky. Everything always goes back to Bucky.” 


	4. Pre-Wedding Jitters

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Double kiss prompts: 
> 
> 17: height difference kisses where one person has to bend down and the other is on their tippy toes  
> 19: kisses meant to distract the other person from whatever they were intently doing

In retrospect, Bucky’s not sure why the hell he agreed to plan a wedding. Okay, “agreed” isn’t even the right word. Why did he  _ask_  to plan a wedding? He’s never even been to one before, and his only concept of what they’re like comes from curling up on the sofa with Steve to eat microwave popcorn and pretend that somehow their lives could be just like Sandra Bullock’s or Reese Witherspoon’s or Renee Zellweger’s.  
  
But Becca had shown him her ring, gushed over one Mr. Benjamin Proctor, and Bucky had heard the words come out of his mouth before he could even stop them.  
  
And now here he is, hiding in a bathroom stall at the Brooklyn Museum while hundreds of Benji and Becca’s family and friends take their seats under the brass chandelier in the Beaux-Arts Court. He’s not panicking. He’s not.

It’s just that the caterer called to say she’s stuck in traffic, and so there’s a wedding about to happen with no clear ETA on cake or tiny quiches or little stuffed mushrooms.

And then the florist called to say that the shipment of lilies never arrived and would it be okay if he used white roses instead and Becca _hates_ roses. So they’d gone through lists of flowers he did have before settling on orchids, which were way over the original budget even with an I’m-sorry-for-the-inconvenience discount. But Becca never has to know that Bucky skimmed a little off his own savings account just to make sure that everything was perfect.  
  
Or that he tried to anyway, considering that his florist is now stuck in the same traffic as the caterer.  
  
But it’s okay. It’s fine.  
  
Fuck.  
  
“Buck, you in here?”  
  
Steve. The person Bucky always thinks about when he’s picturing himself running dramatically through an airport or dumping a handsome well-to-do fella from the city because his childhood sweetheart is better anyhow. Okay, that last one isn’t too far off. Except, well, he and Steve have always been just friends.  
  
Bucky groans from inside the stall, kicks out to nudge the lock open with one shiny black shoe.  
  
Steve appears in the doorway, bangs already flopping into his eyes. The suit he’s got fits him right, the skinny legs and skinny tie making him look more rock star than aspiring artist. He leans into the space, holding himself up with both arms on the door frame.  
  
“What do you need me to do?” Steve asks.  
  
“Kill me?” Bucky shrugs.  
  
“I’d love to, ya big jerk. Unfortunately, I’m kind of attached.”  
  
“We might not have a florist or a caterer. No big deal. Not something every wedding has had since the beginning of time or anything.” Bucky stands up and leans against the wall of the stall. He wants to curl up, grab Steve’s arms and tug them around him. He’d mentioned to a former friend once that Steve’s arms are where he feels safest in the world, and she’d actually laughed at him (and by extension, Steve.) That’s how it always goes with Steve though. People underestimate him.  
  
Not Bucky though. He’s always seen the unyielding fire in those eyes. And he knows Steve would fight like hell for him, win or lose. That’s what’s important.   
  
“Funny story for them to tell the grandchildren,” Steve says. “Come out. Talk to your sister.”  
  
“Steve, there are over six hundred people on the guest list, and a lot of them are already out there. I don’t even know where all these people came from.”  
  
“Facebook, probably.”  
  
“ _Steve_.”  
  
Bucky’s out of the stall now, pacing in front of the sinks and trying to think of some kind of solution. They could run down to the CVS and clean them out of Bagel Bites and Ritz crackers. Get a Duncan Hines mix and throw it together during the ceremony. Shit, does this place even have an oven?  
  
Maybe there’s something he could grab on Uber Eats?  
  
His phone rings again, stopping him in front of a hand dryer. It’s the goddamn priest.  
  
“Oh Christ in heaven,” Bucky says, staring down at the Caller ID. “Steve, it’s… Stevie if we don’t got a priest.” Bucky’s practically vibrating now. He runs his hand back through his hair, mussing up the careful style he’d crafted with a little pomade and hair wax. He can’t bring himself to answer. Let it go to voicemail. Let him find out that way. Hell, it’s 2018. Priests can text, right? Let Father Peterson send him a “sorry” text with a few prayer hands emoji. Fuck it all anyway.  
  
“You have to calm down, Buck. Becca wouldn’t want you like this. She’s just happy to be getting married.”  
  
“I can’t,” Bucky says, his hands trembling. He takes a step, intent on pacing the bathroom again when Steve grabs him by the lapels of his suit jacket.  
  
Bucky stares at him, considers pitching forward and wrinkling up Steve’s nice outfit by burrowing into it and staying there forever. He keeps trembling. In his inside pocket, his phone starts ringing again, vibrating insistently against his chest.  
  
Steve glances at the source of the buzzing and then back at Bucky, his brow creasing with concern. Bucky almost misses the next moment, his mind already wandering back to what he can do to fix, well,  _everything_. But the way Steve sets his jaw snaps him back to the present.  
  
“Steve…”  
  
Steve shakes his head, raises himself up on his tiptoes, and presses his lips firmly against Bucky’s.  
  
It takes Bucky just a second to register what’s happening, and then every other thought he’s ever had slips from his mind, giving way to the fact that Steve is kissing him. Steve. Is. Kissing. Him.  
  
His lips are softer than Bucky would’ve thought them, and oh that sweet way Steve’s hand slips to the back of his neck, curling in the short hair above his nape. His entire body thrums with it, emotion threading through him from his core to his fingertips.  
  
And he knows if he didn’t have to, he’d never ever stop. His own fingers grasp the back of Steve’s jacket, white-knuckling the fabric. He wants him to know, needs him to know, that this is the only thing he’s ever truly wanted so long as he can remember.  
  
And maybe he would’ve stayed there all day, his mouth on Steve’s, if Becca hadn’t shown up.  
  
“Bucky-bear, you in there?” she calls before the door starts creaking open, prompting Steve and Bucky to break apart. “Just warning you that there’s a lady coming in. Look alive, fellas.”  
  
Bucky turns, smiling and physically incapable now of feeling all the worry that was coursing through him before. His sister is a vision, her brown hair piled atop her head with all kinds of rhinestones and little white flowers tucked artfully between strands. Her dress billows out at the waist, a mass of tulle and taffeta that puts him in the mind of Cinderella at the ball.  
  
“You look beautiful, Becca.” She glances between him and Steve, at the way they’re still standing toe to toe even though Bucky’s turned his head toward her.  
  
“Please tell me you two finally got it together,” she says. “Mom will be thrilled. She likes Benji enough, but she’s been dying to get Steve in the family officially since you were, like, seven.”  
  
“We might not have flowers or food, Becca. Or a priest.”  
  
“Uncle Richard’s ordained if we have to. And cool, we’ll get the money back and put it in the house fund. Whatever.”  
  
“See,” Steve says, smiling at him and taking his hand. “I told you it’d be fine.”  
  
In the end, it is fine. The caterer and florist and priest all make it there with a few minutes to spare. Becca gets married, the guests have spanakopita, Benjamin get a traditional face full of buttercream.  
  
And Bucky? Well, Bucky catches the bouquet.  
  
He holds it up to his new boyfriend a bit like a toast before plucking a single orchid bloom free and tucking it behind Steve’s ear.  
  
“Just so you know, Stevie,” Bucky says, “if we ever do get married, you’re planning the wedding.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Btw, the wedding venue is a real place I found doing more research than necessary for a tumblr prompt. It's super pretty and you can [look at the pictures here if you wanna](https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/about/rental). Bucky may have been stressed, but he picked a nice place.

**Author's Note:**

> My inbox and messages are always open on [Tumblr](http://bisexualstarbucky.tumblr.com).
> 
> Also on Twitter [@BiStarBucky](http://www.twitter.com/bistarbucky).


End file.
